NBCU Programmatic Video Guidelines and Specifications

• Mezz – 1920×1080 HD

• High – 1920×1080 HD or 1280x 720 HD

• Medium – 960×540 or 640×480

• Low – 640×360 or 416×234

16:9 HD

10 GB

• Mezz – MP4 or MOV

• High – MP4

• Medium – MP4

• Low – MP4

• Mezz – 10-30 Mbps

• High – 3.25-5 Mbps

• Medium – 1-1.5 Mbps

• Low – 340-460 Kbps

23.98, 24, 25, 29.97, or 30 fps constant frame rate

To ensure creatives are ingested and fulfilled in the most efficient and reliable manner, deliver content in native frame rate and scan mode. NBCUniversal doesn’t accept any pre-processing of creatives (i.e., apply telecine, inverse telecine, scan mode conversion), as pre-processing degrades the creative renditions, which can negatively impact monetization and viewer experience.

Progressive only

• Mezz – Apple ProRes 422 HQ or H.264 (Accepted profiles: High, Main, Baseline)

• High, Medium, Low – H.264 (Accepted profiles: High, Main, Baseline)

• 48 kHz sampling frequency

• Must follow CALM compliance loudness average of –24LKFS +/-2

• 2-channel

  • Without two tracks, audio playback could sound unevenly distributed, making the ads very loud or too quiet and not aligned with the video content

• Mezz – Minimum 192 kbps

• High – Minimum 96 kbps

• Medium – Minimum 96 kbps

• Low – Minimum 96 kbps

VAST 2.0 required.

The maximum unique creatives allowed in rotation is less than 20.

• All tags must be secure HTTPS.

• No VPAID allowed; VAST responses containing VPAID will be flagged and quality control will fail.

• Safe area is a 320×80 box for the countdown and copy.

• Position box with the top left corner at X:128, Y:943; 128px from the left, 943 pixels from the top.

• Baked-in captions are allowed; however, if sending creative with captions, please be mindful of the countdown clock positioning. If your text is left aligned, it will be blocked by the countdown clock.

• The mezz file required for NBCUniversal can also be used for Hulu, but creative targeted directly to Hulu must follow Hulu’s technical specs and acceptance policy.

• NBCU cannot utilize Hulu’s programmatic offering; the “Third-Party Tags/Programmatic” section is not relevant.

• For TV shows and movies, DDT (day, date and time) is not allowed.

• Flighting, frequency capping, and targeting to be applied by NBCUniversal only to ensure contractual obligations and guaranteed delivery.

• No dark dates are permitted at a client level. In the event no brands are live, evergreen creative will run until brands start running again.

• Advertisers are required to refresh creative quarterly to avoid ad fatigue.

• Audio must be included.

• Automated creative blocking/filtering via digital verification vendors is not supported.

• Files should contain the quality necessary to encode the appropriate version for a viewer’s environment across SSAI environments.

• Play-ready files allow for flexibility across a multitude of devices & user bandwidth. Inclusion of multiple rendition files alleviate risk of buffering or poor quality creatives in non-mezzanine inventory and ensures an ad can always play out.